


The Plane to Lisbon

by Phoebe_Zeitgeist



Category: Ginyuu Mokushiroku Meine Liebe | Meine Liebe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-21
Updated: 2008-12-21
Packaged: 2018-01-25 05:44:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1634654
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Phoebe_Zeitgeist/pseuds/Phoebe_Zeitgeist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Written for Akari-chan</p>
    </blockquote>





	The Plane to Lisbon

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Akari-chan

 

 

"Viscount Braunschweig is here, Minister," Josef said, pointedly, as he opened the entry door. 

The announcement was redundant. Passers-by in the street would know that Viscount Braunschweig was here: know it from the strains of Prokofiev's fifth sonata floating down from the wide windows of the commandeered Hotel Liechtenstein, and now down its grand main stairs; Beruze could hardly have been expected to be unaware of it. He closed his eyes and sighed. "Of course," he told Josef. "I think I have mentioned that you need not trouble yourself with these unnecessary errands."

But he knew even as he said it that the words would do no good. This was one of the small irritations of working with comrades, loyal and reliable though they were. Josef was an ideologue, and that meant he cared about ideas; caring about ideas meant that he held strong opinions; holding strong opinions meant that he could not reasonably be dissuaded from expressing them. Josef disapproved of Eduard; of the aristocratic tradition and culture of Cockaigne; of the music of Prokofiev; very likely of Beruze himself. It would be exactly the same next time, for all of Josef's sniff now, and his haughty, "If you say so, Minister." 

"Very well," he said. "I'll see to him." He moved toward the stairs, then paused. "You might wish to take these few hours to rest," he added, without turning. "There are likely to be signals going out later tonight."

"Very good, Minister," Josef said. The satisfaction was clear in his voice now, and Beruze did not need to look back to know all his bearing had changed. He sighed to himself, internally -- it was so easy, with these people -- and followed the music up the carved marble stairs.

* * *

Eduard had, over these past months, adopted the long-neglected concert piano in the first-floor music room, with its broad windows looking east toward the street and south to the gardens. Beruze paused in the doorway to watch him. Eduard, all his attention on the music, was for this fleeting moment unaware of his presence; his face, reflected in the long window, was soft and open, like that of the boy he had been. Still was, Beruze corrected himself; only three years separated the student he had known from the man at the piano. Only a moment, and then Eduard's head moved a little. Beruze saw him catch sight of that same window, of the room reflected in it, of Beruze himself. The music did not cease, but it changed: a little graceful transition, improvised, and ironic Prokofiev gave way to Beethoven, the triumphant main theme from the final movement of the Ninth Symphony.

Beruze smiled, and crossed the room to him. Still, as in his school days, Eduard left his cravats untied, his collars undone, exposing collarbones and the long sweet line of his throat, and the chain he always wore there. Beruze twisted his hand through the red hair (and that too was the same, neither long nor short, in defiance of fashion and politics both) and tilted Eduard's head back, away from keyboard and windows. Eduard gasped, and the music went still, long notes fading into silence. Beruze brought his other hand up then, to play along Eduard's mouth and jaw, and then to settle down around his neck. "Do you know, there are times when I am very grateful that I never quite succeeded in killing you," he said, and leaned down to kiss him.

* * *

"I have news for you," Eduard told him, later. He lay stretched across the bed, all his restlessness for the moment tamed and stilled, like an enormous tawny cat at rest from play.

"I know," Beruze told him "You have had a letter from your sister. Does she like New York?"

"She loves it." Eduard's face lit, as it always did now when he spoke of Erika. "She says that the city feels a hundred times bigger than all of Cockaigne, and the music is better even than the recordings would make me think, and that she has learned to use a typewriter and hopes I won't object if she takes a job, even if she is a viscount's sister. She says your friends have been very kind." His voice changed a little on the final words, and he closed his eyes. "Thank you."

"It is quite unnecessary to thank me," Beruze said. "You're paying for it." That was not, perhaps, precisely true. Eduard's avidity attested to that. It was a curiosity, if a happy one. Eduard, whose hands mastered horses and keyboards alike with startling grace and power, was like one of his own instruments with Beruze, as if coming fully alive only under his hands, or as if this alone were real, the sole thing his body had been intended for. It would be interesting to be able to watch him with Orpherus, or one of the others, and to know whether Eduard mastered them as he did his horses; whether release from the burden of that mastery had been Beruze's alone to give him. 

But release it was in any case; of that there was no doubt. The exchange of favors in return for Eduard's body and his submission was something more than a pretext, but something less than coercion; more a playing at commerce than the thing itself.

Not that the favors were meaningless, or the counters in the game of no worth. As Eduard himself demonstrated now, smiling faintly and drawing Beruze's hand back to his throat. "But, am I paying enough?" he asked. "I have two other sisters, here in this very city."

"Do you?," Beruze asked. "Oh yes. The Countess's daughters." He let himself sound mildly bored and mildly surprised, as though they were a matter so trivial it had for the moment slipped his mind; although neither was true and Eduard would know it. "There, I am afraid, we meet with difficulties. It seems that Duke Wilhelm is rather taken with Arabella." That was true, and so, annoyingly, were the difficulties. An exit visa for an unknown girl was not so difficult for the Ministry, despite everything. An exit visa for a potential wife to the heir presumptive was another matter.

"She doesn't like him."

And that, of course, was the problem; were it not for her marital prospects, the girl would be as safe at home as she would be travelling to Lisbon and from there on to sanctuary in New York. "No?" he told Eduard. "Well, perhaps we should not be too surprised. There are so few people who do. It is a pity that he couldn't have fixed his interest on the Vermiglia girl." 

Eduard laughed then, sharp and short. "Is it? I've heard stories."

Beruze shrugged. "A matter of perspective. She would have poisoned the King, and then strangled Wilhelm in his sleep and proclaimed herself queen regnant. And then we would have had civil war. But perhaps no more kings, at the end of it."

He was aware, suddenly, of Eduard staring at him, something new and unreadable in his face. "Or perhaps a different king," he said at last. "Your majesty."

"Do you think that's what I _want_?" The rage, as always, surprised him with its swiftness and irresistable pull; he had spoken, and his body had stiffened with adrenaline, ahead of conscious thought. 

"There might be . . . advantages." Eduard's breath had gone unsteady, and there was renewed heat in his voice. Beruze realized that his own hand had closed around Eduard's wrist like a shackle: it was going to leave a bruise. "The palace guard is very, very pretty, you know," Eduard continued, shakily. "I always used to notice that."

"But I have you." He moved then, to capture Ed's other wrist. "And you are so delightfully enthusiastic." 

"And I have a debt to pay," Eduard said. His mouth was pressed into Beruze's hand, and the words were muffled; then there were no further words at all.

* * *

"You will not be able to stay tonight," Beruze told him at last. 

Eduard was curled against him with his head resting in the crook of Beruze's arm, and he felt rather than saw Eduard's nod. "You're not still angry?" Eduard said.

"No. I am curious, though. How did you know?"

"I didn't," Eduard said. He spoke slowly, as if thinking it out as he went. "But . . . I should have seen it before. You look like Lui. The shape of your face, of your eyes. Your eyes are even the same color as his, just a little paler." He paused, and when he spoke again his voice was firmer. "Whatever Werner believed, and you were intended to believe, whoever arranged this didn't think in the long term. Children might look like anyone, but it's different once they're grown."

"Ah. Happily, very few people are quite so observant as you are. And as it is far too late for my actual father to acknowledge me, I think I can rest secure." 

"Secure?" Eduard said. "I thought you wanted --"

Beruze cut him off. "No. Once, perhaps, but I was a child then. My cousin Ludwig has never been a fool. I want the crown no more than he does. You may tell him I said so."

"Tell him?" There was nothing, admirably, but blank confusion in Eduard's face and voice.

"I shall need you to carry a message for me. -- Don't trouble yourself," he added, tapping Eduard's lips as the words of denial began to form there. "It would be tiresome, and it would be unconvincing, and it is entirely unnecessary. A week from now, maybe sooner, and we will be allies. There's no need to waste the time between." 

Eduard's breath caught. "Allies? How so?"

"The board is about to change. That fool in Berlin has turned to the East. He will set aside the treaty and attack the Soviet Union; the plans and movements now afoot on the continent admit of no other interpretation. It will be within days now, not weeks. You are to inform Ludwig."

"Russia," Eduard said, slowly. He could see the pieces falling into place, somewhere in the depths of the wide green eyes. "Not England, not Deutschland. Russia. Of course."

"Of course," Beruze agreed. "You may tell Ludwig that there is nothing in our motives that need trouble him. We look forward to the revolution everywhere, of course, but circumstances change. Tell him that revolutions must come from the people, when they are ready, not from even the most well-intentioned fraternal efforts of the workers of more socially advanced lands. We offer what aid we can in the common struggle, nothing more."

"For the present."

"For the present," he agreed once more. "The present, which is all we any of us have in our grasp. -- Your wrists will be bruised. You are going to need to wear your cuffs closed, these next few days."

"It was worth it," Eduard said. He was smiling again, apparently as careless as ever, as he rose from the bed. "Do you know, I had forgotten to tell you. I might be out of the city for a few days this week."

"Very good," Beruze said. "Come see me when you get back. Perhaps I'll have an exit visa for you."

"Or perhaps not."

"Perhaps not," Beruze agreed. "In fact, more likely not. I'll see you then."

 


End file.
